SELWESKI: Will ringers' muddy up the 2012 election?

When I first saw the press release I was stunned and bemused: state Attorney General Bill Schuette had filed criminal charges against two Grosse Pointe Park residents for putting a “ringer” candidate on an election ballot.

If that were the standard in the 1980s and 1990s, half the elected officials in Macomb County would have been thrown in jail. With Tuesday’s 2012 candidate filing deadline fast approaching, the dearth of candidates on the ballot this year is enough to make a political junkie yearn for the days when candidates never knew for sure who was a ringer and who was real.

A ringer, for the uninitiated, is essentially a fake candidate. It is a name placed on the ballot to confuse voters or to water down the vote along the lines of gender or ethnicity.

For example, a county commissioner faces a strong challenge in the primary from John Smith. So, he rounds up a Joe Smith and a John Smythe to file as candidates in his race. They are supporters of the incumbent. They are in on the shenanigans. And they never campaign for the office. But they successfully siphon away votes from John Smith – and the incumbent wins.

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Unless, of course, the incumbent, Jim Campanski, faces a James Componski — a ringer thrown in by John Smith — and falls victim to an added layer of voter confusion on Election Day.

In the past, those types of tricks were standard procedure in Macomb politics. In some races, eight primary election candidates would line up for a seat and only one or two would not be ringers. That’s the way the game was played.

In 1992, Dave Jaye, then a state representative, was nearly assured of winning the Republican primary but he had some concerns about beating a Democrat in the November election. So, legend has it, he convinced an old college roommate, Steve Kostiuk, to put his name on the ballot as a Democratic candidate.

Kostiuk waged no semblance of a campaign but still somehow won the Democratic primary. Jaye was facing his own ringer in the general election, so he coasted through the rest of the campaign season. One can almost hear the now-disgraced former lawmaker laughing and cackling on Election Night in August when Kostiuk came out on top.

That’s when a candidate hits gold — when his attempt to splinter the vote succeeds to the point that his ringer knocks out the competition and leaves the candidate with a free ride in November.

Of course, these kinds of games can backfire.

My favorite ringer story is about former county commissioner Mike Walsh’s attempt to get elected to the county public works commissioner post in 1992. It was an extraordinarily crowded field because of the retirement of longtime public works boss Tom Welsh — that’s Welsh, not Walsh.

Walsh, of course, was hoping voters would mistake his surname for that of the outgoing incumbent. But he was also worried about a couple of female candidates who had filed. As a result, he put his daughter in the race as a ringer to split up the female vote.

It didn’t quite work out. The daughter, Pamela Walsh, who did not campaign at all, beat her father on Election Day.

Welsh (not Walsh) was probably the king of the ringer game. He would toss in several ringers, making it appear that any strong challenger would have to deal with a cluttered field, and each of those fake candidates would magically withdraw from the race after the filing deadline. Typically, that left Welsh with only token opposition.

His successor, Tony Marrocco has demonstrated his own prowess at confusing his opponents with phantom filings.

The practice of filing counterfeit candidates has faded substantially in recent years, but it was on full display as recently as 2008 when incumbent state representative Sarah Roberts faced seven challengers in the Democratic primary.

Four candidates were twentysomethings, like Roberts’ lone Republican opponent, Bryan Brandenburg, who was hoping to succeed his term-limited father, Jack. Another Democrat in the race was a political ally of Jack Brandenburg, who is now a state senator.

Bryan Brandenburg denied that the Democratic candidates were his ringers. The four young contenders included two who were not registered to vote prior to filing for office. One, with the first name of Sarah, filed her paperwork and included a contact phone number for a Lowes store. She did not work there. One of the newly registered candidates had his voter registration card returned by the Post Office to St. Clair Shores City Hall because he provided a false address.

In the 2010 9th District state Senate race, the tables were turned when Jack Brandenburg faced a jumbled GOP field that included Zack Brandenburg. Zack vs. Jack.

Zack, a 21-year-old rock drummer from Chesterfield Township who filed at the last minute, abruptly dropped out when he was hounded by reporters and Brandenburg supporters seeking an admission that he was a ringer.

That’s the ringer’s code of conduct. Never admit you are one. Try not to show your face. And, based on the prevailing track record, no one will ever prove you are one.

Years ago, when I tried to confirm that a candidate in a state House contest with Sal Rocca as the incumbent was a ringer designed to muddy up the race, I visited the challenger’s home three times. No answer at the door. No cars in the driveway. On my third attempt, I talked to a neighbor who told me he was under the impression that the mystery candidate was on a long vacation overseas.

These dirty tricks, however, can go too far. In the criminal case pursued by Schuette, a mother-son duo associated with state Sen. Lamar Lemmons, Jr., filled out a ringer’s paperwork without telling him that his name was filed as a candidate in the Lemmons race.

Nonetheless, there are few rules in this game. Which is why I’m sure it will make a comeback. After all, it’s been a tried-and-true tactic in American politics for many, many years.

In Virginia, back when voters directly elected the Electoral College that formally chooses the president, the Federalists nominated a candidate with the same first and last name as that of a Republican opponent, forcing voters to identify their preferred candidate by his middle initial. Or engage in a guessing game in the voting booth.

How far back was that bit of trickery? The election of 1800.

You can contact Chad Selweski at chad.selweski@macombdaily.com. You can read his blog at macombpolitics.blogspot.com.